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DavidGilbert99 writes with this excerpt from IB Times: "The Sandy Hook shooting once again raised the debate about how much power violent videogames wield over teenagers. Following proclamations from the National Rifle Association and the establishment of a study by the National Academy of Sciences to investigate the psychological effects of violent games on children, a group in Connecticut is now having its say Southington, a town 30 miles from where the shooting took place, is offering gift tokens in exchange for violent videogames, as well as other violent media such as DVDs or videos. The group, called SouthingtonSOS, said in a statement: 'There is ample evidence that violent video games, along with violent media of all kinds, including TV and movies portraying story after story showing a continuous stream of violence and killing, has contributed to increasing aggressiveness, fear, anxiety and is desensitizing our children to acts of violence including bullying.'" And Yes, they plan to destroy the traded-in games. (Note: Beware the obnoxious auto-playing video ad with sound; adjust volume accordingly.)

Then you run into the same problem as people trading in broken or useless guns to the gun buyback:

By turning in your property, you effectively endorse their political cause. They get to say that "X number of people turned in this filth to get it off of our streets and out of our schools!". Personally, I'm not willing to become part of their cause and make that value of X going higher at any cost.

If you actually do find their message convincing then by all means turn in your games.

Then you run into the same problem as people trading in broken or useless guns to the gun buyback:

By turning in your property, you effectively endorse their political cause. They get to say that "X number of people turned in this filth to get it off of our streets and out of our schools!". Personally, I'm not willing to become part of their cause and make that value of X going higher at any cost.

If you actually do find their message convincing then by all means turn in your games.

But if you use the reward you get from the group to directly support the opposite of their agenda... did you really help them? For instance, using the gift token to buy a new FPS game.

I would like to think they would somehow arrange for the reward to not be able to be used in this way, but groups like this tend not to be terribly forward thinking.

Yes you do. You need to think emotionally and politically.No one is gong to track what you spend your token on. They will just count the number of games Point at the pile and say 'See!' why won't you DOOOOOOO something!'

Well..., no, because the problem isn't books, or games. The problem is bad parenting. Period. A violent book, or video game, by itself isn't the problem. The problem is the absence of a parent or other guiding influence to provide perspective and help the child understand the difference between books, games, movies, etc. and real life. I shit you not - I know of one case where a young man nearly cost his friend his life. They had a disagreement of some kind and the solution was to "Just shoot him a little."

Lately they've been doing gift certificates to grocery stores and such, but completely forgetting that money is fungible - money I suddenly didn't have to spend on groceries is freed up for buying, well whatever else, including guns. That's the thing, though. Unless the trade-in doesn't involve money or any tangible good, it become a fungible item.

I think that the anti-gun lobbies and authorities who host these things could have benefited from consulting any divorce lawyer when it comes to the subject of all things fungible, no?

Lately they've been doing gift certificates to grocery stores and such, but completely forgetting that money is fungible - money I suddenly didn't have to spend on groceries is freed up for buying, well whatever else, including guns. That's the thing, though. Unless the trade-in doesn't involve money or any tangible good, it become a fungible item.

I think that the anti-gun lobbies and authorities who host these things could have benefited from consulting any divorce lawyer when it comes to the subject of all things fungible, no?

I'd be willing to give up some of my old titles that I no longer play if they'd give me more value than gamestop...

I would gladly give up a slew of DVDs that have violence in the films.

The one thing I can't do is get rid of the violence through the news that I've been slammed with my whole life. I can't 'undo' that one with a trade-in...

I wonder if they even care about movies, or if maybe they've watched enough movies that they think it is only video game violence that matters... I dunno. It seems stupid to think violent video games would be any more of a problem than violent media in general. I have a Twista album on

NO! Pinball is too violent.The little steel ball was resting comfortably when you put in the coins, then sart your abuse with hitting it out of its rest. This is followed by continuously slapping the ball with paddles and propelling it into walls! All the time, the ball is just trying to get back to the safety of its home, but NO, you keep batting it away.

The only civilized game is Canasta, because I'm not sure how to play it.

I have long thought attempts to do this kind of thing were stupid and intrusive.

But think, those of you with kids, how many times have you refused your kids desire to watch a program because it is too violent? If you are any kind of parent, then that happens often. Desensitization [killology.com] is a long time practice in the military and kids watching/playing violent shows/games is very similar to the process the military goes through.

I think it's time that this subject is given a hard look. Unfortunately, any solution

i really REALLY don't get this obsession with linking violent video games to violent behavior. Take yours truly:

Born in 1980, I played all the big titles: From Wolfenstein, Doom, Solider of Fortune, to whatever latest titles are out (I can't remember what all the Call of Duty flavors are called, but you get the idea). Hell, I even designed Doom and Half-Life levels based on my old high school (shit, don't tell anyone or they'll come after me next!!!)

At some point in my 20s, I joined the Marines for 4 years, so I know how to use a rifle.

Neither before nor after my service have i EVER had violent tendencies that made me go on a shooting spree. I deal with stress every day (Hello IT, working for an international liquor company that needs to be up 24/7) yet I still score normal blood pressure numbers.

I just don't get this obsession. There are always a few nuts. The rest of us are fairly well-adjusted.

The obsession isn't anything new, the target is just different now. Used to be that comic books were the cause of all moral decay in america's youth. Go far enough back and i'd put good money that someone thought opera was the reason for violent crime. So just remember that you don't understand this obsession when holographic vid novels are dragged through the mud as being responsible for all of societies woes and maybe we can break this stupid cycle.

i really REALLY don't get this obsession with linking violent video games to violent behavior. Take yours truly:

Born in 1980, I played all the big titles: From Wolfenstein, Doom, Solider of Fortune, to whatever latest titles are out (I can't remember what all the Call of Duty flavors are called, but you get the idea). Hell, I even designed Doom and Half-Life levels based on my old high school (shit, don't tell anyone or they'll come after me next!!!)

At some point in my 20s, I joined the Marines for 4 years, so I know how to use a rifle.

Neither before nor after my service have i EVER had violent tendencies that made me go on a shooting spree. I deal with stress every day (Hello IT, working for an international liquor company that needs to be up 24/7) yet I still score normal blood pressure numbers.

I just don't get this obsession. There are always a few nuts. The rest of us are fairly well-adjusted.

Stupid media. Stupid fear-mongering. Stupid people.

done ranting now.

S/F

You became a professional soldier but you don't see that as an expression of your violent tendencies?

You became a professional soldier but you don't see that as an expression of your violent tendencies?

Step back from yourself for a moment and think about that.

Oh, bullshit.

People join the armed forces because it's a job with a regular paycheck. They join because the military offers some sweet medical benefits. They join because they want to go to college without spending the rest of their lives in debt. They join because they had family members in the military.

And some of them join because they believe the Constitution and what it represents matters enough to risk their lives defending it.

I just don't get this obsession. There are always a few nuts. The rest of us are fairly well-adjusted.

THIS. A thousand times.

Look -- I think the gun control crowd basically has one legitimate point that is nearly triviailly weighed against. My bias declared up front.

But there's been school shootings for at least four centuries. Their frequency is likely easily plotted out with some basic statistical physics or similar applications. The "epidemic" is so insubstantial as to be boring to everyone but CDC types with a moral obligation to treat it as such.

But I don't even need science for this, just memory and a bit of knowledge of history.

Before I was born there were witch trials, pogroms, purges, mccarthyism.... and all of these were in reaction to *shit happening* (although not necessarily caused by the victims of these activities)

In my relatively short lifetime there's been panic over D&D/satanism, rock & rap music (remember tipper gore?), trenchcoats (after columbine), pedos, terrorism, and I would claim drug use. Every five years or so we need a new internal societal threat.

These might all have a legit correlation with some form of violence. I really don't know (or care -- if they are or aren't correlated is immaterial to me, they mostly fall under the guise of the 0th freedom of thought).

But people want to find a way to understand bad things happening. They will latch on and clasp desperately to God, to an outlier, to anything to explain the 'senseless' violence they see rather than admit we are big dangerous apes with a thin veneer of civilization.

To point out anything not them that they can collectively engage in risk-free destruction of in part of the big orgy of lynchmobbery -- ideally through the tyranny of the majority driven through by the rifles of the government and their easy taxy dollars. Because this is how civilized white people destroy things -- with a pen stroke instead of a rioting mob.

i really REALLY don't get this obsession with linking violent video games to violent behavior.

Well, for starters, exposure to anything desensitizes. It's why the military uses the same games to train soldiers these days - because they know the first kill is hard (many get ill or sick), but by desensitizing them to the violence and reducing the value of life to a mere statistic, when ordered to shoot and kill, they most likely will.

That's the most tenable and demonstratable link to violence in videogames to

Actually, it doesn't even prove that. It proves that the military believes the games are useful for training in some way--which might be making trainees more willing to kill, or it might be improving their reflexes or their tactical awareness, or it might just be as a morale-boosting tool for a generation of recruits who grew up playing the games. Personally, having served as both an infantryman and a medic, and having become very familiar in the latter capacity with what the consequences of real-world violence look like, I'm deeply skeptical that even the most realistic modern video games will do much to "desensitize" anyone to actual killing.

You might want to read some of the criticisms [wikipedia.org] of the author of that article. His motives are deeply suspect, and there's so much literature on the subject that it's easy to cherry-pick. (Note to anyone dragging out the "ad hominem" card: this is entirely relevant to the subject at hand, and casts serious doubt on anything he has to say about the subject.) Here [tamiu.edu] (PDF link) is a rebuttal to his primary claims--which, unlike the link you provided, actually goes into some detail about the methods of analysis.

Whatever the generation in power didn't grow up with becomes the Bogeyman. In the 60s through the 80s it was that Devil music Rock And Roll. In the 90s it was Rap. Now it's Violent video games. After violent video games I'm sure it'll be something else to blame for the problems in society.

People just have bad memories and think when They Grew Up, it was some golden age. Nope.. no societal problems in the 50s or 60s. No Sirrr-ee.

It's been my experience that when kids can work out tension playing these games they tend to be better off in real life than the kids whose parents won't even let them play cops and robbers, let alone have a toy gun.

They're all fucking mentally deranged morons. And since they are against entertainment media (and basically freedom of speech and expression) while apparently the killer wasn't, I conclude that violent video games are not the common correlation here. It's dumbasses. I'd rather see the country rid itself of them, send them away for "disposal," but that will of course never happen.

"Rather, SouthingtonSOS is saying that there is ample evidence that violent video games, along with violent media of all kinds, including TV and movies portraying story after story showing a continuous stream of violence and killing, has contributed to increasing aggressiveness, fear, anxiety and is desensitizing our children to acts of violence including bullying.

The "or" means it could contribute only to a single one of them and the entire statement would still be true, but totally meaningless. Furthermor

That's hilariously stupid on so many levels. For one thing, if kids were desensitized to bullying, it wouldn't be bullying! Secondly, it's the goddamn adults who refuse to pay any attention to bullying, at least until the person being bullied snaps.

All the crappy FPS shooters and worthless ancient violent games that I have filling up my bookcase since 1992, I can give to these guys and I'll get CREDIT that I can use toward some other game that I might actually want??(No I didn't read TFA, I'm not going to that site, thanks.)

Game companies like this because it takes traded in games off the market and so they'll sell more new games. This only serves as an inducement to make more violent games.

So, giant failure.

Even bigger failure is that there is no correlation between video games and violence. There are countless studies, but I like this fact: Japan has 0.6% as many gun deaths as the US.* I wonder if they play video games over there?

* 10.2 per 100,000 per year in the US vs 0.07 for Japan according to Wikipedia [wikipedia.org].

Is there any evidence whatsoever that the recent shooter even played video games at all? I hate these people. Bunch of fucking reactionary idiots. We have these shootings because we've created gun-free target practice zones for anybody who wants to ignore the sign and shoot up the place. There have always been and will always be crazy people willing to kill a lot of innocents. This shit just happens now because we've given them ample opportunity to cause an extreme amount of damage without any hindranc

Honestly, it doesn't matter. Video games are so prevelant... it's hard to find anyone 35 or under that both (A) does NOT have a violent video game in the house and (B) hasn't played violent video games in the past. You might as well blame bottled water: chances are you either have a bottle somewhere in your house or you've at least drank some in the last X years.

It's like when Jack Thomson proclaimed during hours one of the school shooting a few years ago before the police released any details or went to

I will just point out that I've been through this before with the scares in the 1980's around "Dungeons and Dragons". Which was considered then a clearly dangerous game - after all, children who liked to pretend that they lived as heroes in a violent universe killing monsters would clearly grow up to be violent maniacs. As we now know, D&D is mostly dangerous in terms of "if you let it slip that you like D&D, the jocks will beat you up." and the theories that D&D would teach the children to be violent have been (largely) refuted.

I don't blame them for thinking as such, but that's because they are desperately in need of doing something to somehow make sense of the terrible tragedy of Newtown.
But taking away violent video games will not solve the problem. Heck, define violences to begin with? some of the old disney and warner bros cartoons at some point were deemed to violent to be on TV.
No, the solution isn't avoidance of violence, but rather, guidance.
Educate our kids what is fiction and what is reality.
Nobody wants to adm

There are 3 types of gun-owners imo.
1. Hunters. I am not worried about them. I've confronted armed hunters in the woods. They have actually killed and eaten living things and understand death.
2. Video-gamers. They point and click and pretend-kill things. I am not worried about them even if they own a gun because real life shooting is not anything like gaming. (I suspect most don't own a gun at all which is why I don't count them in this list)
3. Sport shooters who frequent ranges. These assholes scare the shit out of me. They have never killed anything at all so aren't actually familiar with the destructive capability of their weapon. In addition, they are intimately trained in its use and they _like_ to shoot.
4. Scared citizens who buy a gun for protection. These guys aren't too bad but do cause most of the gun destruction in the US, either simply by having a gun int he house to make it easy for suicide and accident or by having it in reach of some angry guy whose girlfriend just broke up with him and now he's gonna make her pay along with anyone else who happens to be in the vicinity.

As far as the NRA proposal, if we suggested putting an armed guard at every single school in Afghanistan, would that be a sign we are winning the war there or losing it?

I'd trust some football-playing hothead who says what's on his mind and cools down minutes after a rage much more than some silent, coddled, brooding nerd-loser who chooses to mass-murder out of anger at their own weakness and defeatism.

The problem is the mental wiring. A nerd-loser isn't wired to like sports, in the same way a jock isn't wired to like Dungeons and Dragons. A jock *enjoys* sports, a nerd-loser doesn't - So it's much harder to get them into it.

Not sure about student athletes, but there was the recent case of Jovan Belcher, a professional football player who killed his girlfriend, drove to the team headquarters, and killed himself in front of his head coach and GM. Also relevant is that the jocks are much more likely to be involved in assaults, rapes, vehicular homicides, and other violent acts other than shooting up a school.

George Carlin had this one right: ""They say it's the quiet ones you have to watch. Yeah, and while you're watching a quiet one, a noisy one will kill ya!"

No, the jocks don't do they actual shooting themselves. But they are likely the ones who bullied the nerd into the rage that triggered the nerd's violent actions, so they are also responsible to some degree.
I played hockey since I was 5, and also played for my high school for a year. But I had to quit - because of all the idiot jocks and their homophobia, misogyny, and general distaste for anything they couldn't understand or was slightly different from them. You should have heard the shit that was talked about in the locker room. Yeah, those dumb louts sure had a firm grip on their emotions all right.

Jocks go on to become executives, lawyers, and politicians. Social outcasts might shoot up a movie theater every year or so, but it was jocks who got us into Iraq and caused civilian casualties in the hundreds of thousands.

When's the last time you saw somebody who was a student athlete shoot up a school or movie theater?

Sports are charged with testosterone, true, but they also teach people how to lose gracefully and that losing is a part of life. I'd trust some football-playing hothead who says what's on his mind and cools down minutes after a rage much more than some silent, coddled, brooding nerd-loser who chooses to mass-murder out of anger at their own weakness and defeatism.

So in short, you accuse athletes of being bullies and brutes, but it turns out that the dumb louts actually manage their emotions better than you do.

-- Ethanol-fueled

No, student athletes don't shoot up movie theaters, they just rape girls and brag about it to their friends [huff.to]. Then the school community covers it up for them because in redneck America highschool football "stars" are the darlings of town.

The student athlete would be protected by the community, after all he is a good kid who made a few mistakes, besides he just could make it into the big leagues. While the straight A student caught with Aspirin is kicked out of school because he worthless druggy. We need more Baby Ruths not Einsteins.

Apparently, this line between voluntary mind control [wikipedia.org] and coercive mind control is not obvious to everyone. For example, on which side do religious movements such as Jehovah's Witnesses fall, especially considering their practice of shunning those who have left their religion?

Folks might want to check the crime stats before making blanket statements about "increasing" levels of violent crime due to video games or access to computers. The Internet era has turned into the safest era since violent crimes shot up in the mid-70's, and rates of homicides and property crimes are at their lowest point since the 60's.

We also know that increasing the drinking age is a big factor. Most violent crimes are committed by young males aged 17-25, and a huge percentage of violent crimes are associated with alcohol use. Alcohol + high-testosterone is obviously a recipe for a fight in many cases. If you recall, the drinking ages started increasing rapidly from 18 years old to 21 in the early 1980's as part of a nationwide reform.

Simply responded to the statement in TFS that violent crime is increasing in the US. In fact, violent crime, property crime, and homicide have all dramatically decreased since they peaked in America in the 70's. Us fraud examiners pay attention to criminology stats.

And anyone using "video-game induced crime" figures are just manipulating data to cherry pick the results they desire. It's not bashing video games I have a problem with, it is manipulating data to achieve the pre-determined results they had decided long before they even considered any of the actual data. Junk science and non-scientific studies are the problem here. There is no such thing as "video game related crime" - there has never been any actual scientific studies by a non-biased research group that p

I don't care if people criticize video games - I'm opposed to people demonizing video games, when the facts seem to say otherwise. In regards to video game related crime, from http://www.theeca.com/video_games_violence [theeca.com] website:

As videogames have become more popular in the U.S., violent crime has decreased dramatically, particularly among youth.
In 2001, the U.S. Surgeon General found that: "...it was extremely difficult to distinguish between the relatively small long-term effects of exposure to media violence and those of other influences."
In the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) report on school violence, Lessons Learned: An FBI Perspective School Violence Seminar, they include a school shooter profile listing thirty factors that may be indicators of potentially devastating violent acts, but the FBI excluded playing video games from that list.
In a four part series on rampage killings, the New York Times examined the influence of media on offenders' actions and found: "While the killings have caused many people to point to the violent aspects of the culture, a closer look shows little evidence that video games, movies or television encouraged many of the attacks."

Incidentally, something like 2 days later a guy kills a couple of firemen with the same gun (a Bushmaster.223) and the guy is obviously not a video game player, but we won't mention that anywhere. Another guy shoots up a shopping mall and also is not known to be a video game player, so no talk of what caused his craziness. Suddenly the media hears "the shooter is a video game player" and Jesus is on the fucking cross and video games are to blame.

In fact, young men (age 17-24) play a lot of video games, and at the same time young men (age 17-24) have ALWAYS committed most of the violent acts in a society. It's a function of testosterone fueled aggressive emotions, and in Western culture it is particularly exacerbated by high levels of alcohol and drug abuse. Take away the booze and drugs from younger men, and you will find that the video games and heavy metal music and gore movies and other factors probably wouldn't have much effect at all. And keep

Not quite. That is ONE definition of coercion. Merriam-Webster [merriam-webster.com] defines coercion as-
1 : to restrain or dominate by force
2 : to compel to an act or choice
3 : to achieve by force or threat

So #2 does not require force or threats, and one can be coerced without threats or physical force.

As a wise man on the internet once said "You don't get to change the meaning to suit your world view."

After all, they are asking people to voluntarily turn in their video games which people are free to do -- or not. This stands in stark contrast to those who would ban violent video games entirely and who would most likely support video game confiscation and for those who really want to play violent video games, background checks and registration. By requiring registration, it ensures that some newspaper will publish a map as to who owns violent video games or not so that violent video game owner's friends and neighbors may demonize them.

Meanwhile, I'll burn a stack of CD's that I can turn in for a stack of coupons.

While I understand the impulse to "do something" in response to the Sandy Hook shootings, I'm bewildered that this is the issue they've decided to pursue. It's quite simply a misdirected effort that will have absolutely no effect to curtail further mass shootings.

But the sandy bridge shooter didn't play violent video games... He played star craft.. His brother was the one who did, so the media thought he did the shooting. They blamed the shooting on the wrong person because the media is retarded.

As the AC mentioned, Starcraft isn't a first/third person shooter - it's not a 'trainer' for shooting people like you could say for games like counterstrike.

On the topic of violent video games in general, I remember the graph of youth violence up against major console releases - youth violence has experienced a drop after each release. As far as I know, the 'ample research' on violent media and it's effects on kids consists of some poorly constructed double blind studies involving pre-teen children and did things like conclude 'cartoons increase violent behavior' where they included live action shows like power rangers in the cartoon category. The increased violence was for a short period while the kids were allowed to run rampant without adult supervision, where they demonstrated imitative behavior for the *live action* shows.

Teenagers who play video games are actually less likely to be violent - maybe they're venting their anger/violence in a safe manner? Maybe they're just too unfit as a result to get into much trouble?

I've mowed down tens of thousands in just first person shooters alone. I haven't been tempted to shoot anybody in real life, and we had plenty of people commit horrible shoots before TV even existed, much less video games.

Actually I just had a vision of the ED-209 from RoboCop standing outside someones door announcing:"Citizen! If you surrender your violent games and media, no one will be hurt!" After waiting an intolerable.05 seconds without a response, ED-209 proceeds to level the domicile. The game playing "perp" remains safe in the basement as no one has fixed the ED-209 "stair problem" yet...

for the shooting, and, btw buy more guns because that will solve the problem.

The use FUD, lies to spread an emotional argument. Couple that with the fact people don't want to question what they are emotional attached with. Guns and getting socialized health care are cast aside to go after video games. It easy target because these people are already emotional attached to the idea that video games are wrong.

The NRA is full of memeber who ahve no wish to actual confront this issue.

With respect to firearms you have things absolutely backwards. Unlike with video games, the NRA is well informed and has the facts on their side regarding firearms.

... and a serious look at the that data about gun control. Something they stop wanting about 15 years ago when the data very clearly shows a decrease in killing when guns are severly restricted.

You are mistaken. The data actually shows no correlation. There are regions in the US with severe restrictions where the murder rate is low and there are regions with lax firearms regulations where the murder rate is low. Its not the presence or absence of firearms itself that leads to a low murder rate, there are some other factors that do so. More likely it has something to do with education and poverty. Lets look at Switzerland where many households have real assault rifles (fully automatic), high capacity magazines and 300 rounds of ammunition in their home. One difference between the Swiss and the US is that the Swiss did receive proper training and keep the weapon and ammunition locked up.

You want more real data? Hunting related accidents dropped dramatically after hunter safety classes became required in the US in order to get a hunting license. Anyone who has had such a class can testify that the majority of the class is basic firearms safety. 1/3 of firearms deaths are accidents. Many of these deaths could probably be prevented by requiring firearms owners to take a safety class before they get their first gun, much like hunters are required to take their safety class before they get their first license.

As far as the NRA goes with respect to reasonable legislation. They have helped write some. When naive gun control types got all hysterical over cop-killer bullets these folks drafted legislation that would outlaw all ammunition with some sort of coating. This would have outlawed nearly all ammunition over.22 calibre, basically anything with a full or partial copper jacket. The NRA helped rewrite the legislation so it applied only to the teflon coated ammunition notorious for penetrating body armor. Again naive gun control types got all hysterical over plastic guns and drafted legislation to outlaw everything without some number of ounces of steel. The problem here is that many firearms that are perfectly detectable in metal detectors are using metal alloys that are not technically steel. The NRA helped rewrite this legislation so that it only banned firearms that were not detectable in the metal detectors of the day.

Similarly the "assault weapon" bans are also largely hysteria. There is no difference in capability between the so called "assault weapons" and normal semiauto hunting rifles. Both fire the same ammunition and when a hunting magazine (5 round max) is inserted into the "assault weapon" it fire no more rounds and no faster than the hunting rifle. On the flip side when a military magazine (say 30 round capacity) is put into the hunting rifle it has the same capability as the "assault weapon" with such a magazine. The only differences between the "assault weapon" and the semiauto hunting rifle are cosmetic, appearance not function.

NRA members and many firearms owners understand this. That is why the last time an "assault weapon" ban was passed firearms owning republicans, democrats and independents who had no interest in buying an "assault weapon" threw out many of the politicians who voted for the ban. They rightfully feared that their regular semiauto hunting and sporting rifles and shotguns were in danger of being banned next. It happened in various European countries. The original "assault weapon" ban legislation in the US specifically listed certain firearms designs that did not include regular hunting and sporting firearms but this legislation also allowed the Secretary of the Treasury (oversees Alcohol Tobacco

Dunno..sounds like would have the opposite effect: shooter goes to NRA convention, pulls out gun, gets off two maybe three shots...then is gunned down himself by everyone there.

End Totals:
Sandy Hook: 30 dead + gunman
NRA: 2 dead +gunman

On the other hand could end up with the world's largest bloodbath as people miss, hit the wrong people, people have no idea who the original shooter was, and they all just fire at anything remotely threatening (i.e. everyone else).

While a misunderstanding could lead to a bloodbath, the reality is that almost everyone who doesn't hightail it out of there will hit the deck, find cover, draw their weapons and threaten to shoot anyone they don't know who moves towards them. It would be the biggest Mexican standoff ever recorded, but if no one went literally nuts, it would probably be stable until the police arrive to disarm everyone.

More guns could cause problems in a crowded area, but a great deal of people who might be at those conventions are probably trained and experienced in the use of firearms and they wouldn't necessarily be unable to do threat identification. Not to mention you'll probably get at least one off-duty cop in the mix.

Long story short... it's going to require a massive cultural shift. Problem is, too many people stand to make too much profit off of not doing that. News media will blame the viewers without stopping to think that they themselves created the viewership. Hollywood will do the same, and so one down the line, all forgetting that they all participated in building that lowest-common-denominator which we have today. The NRA will of course defensively want to keep every type of firearm legal, as they're too busy staring at the slippery slope of rights-curtailment and not liking what they see, but neglecting to see that sometimes maybe some folks don't need the things. Overly-busy parents aren't going to want to curtail their lifestyle and actually pay close attention to WTF their kid is watching, playing, and reading - especially if those kids are teenagers. Sometimes those parents can't slow down (e.g. the single working parent) - overall, this is going to require a strengthening of marriage (though not by law, but by culture).

As you can see, there are too many people won either like the status quo, or hate it but fear changing it (especially if that change introduces responsibility). So I fully expect a whole lot of nothing to be done at the least, or a lot of the wrong things done at the worst.

Meanwhile, some as-yet-anonymous sad loser of a kid quietly designs a bomb that will utilize the school's natural gas line...

Now, the customer of that game is forced to buy, at full price and royalties to author, another full licensed version, instead of buying the recycled one, from which only the reseller, not the author, profits.

How much are they giving per game? Because if it works like some gun-buybacks, you'll get people bringing in old copies of Daikatana and using the resulting certificates to buy the latest call of duty...

I've seen it multiple times - a gunnie will collect 'scrap metal' guns worth maybe $20 for the metal in them, then go to Chicago for a gun buyback and get $100 gift certificates for them. Most of the guns don't even work, or would be unsafe to fire if they did. They then proceed to buy a nice NEW gun for their collection.

While initially (and likely) harmless, such events echo a dark past. The US has a long history of 'voluntary' destruction of scapegoat media which, if they latch on to a big enough moral panic, end up exerting significant social pressure on people to 'volunteer'. They also tend to have the problem of parents (or other quasi authority figures lik significant others) getting caught up in the hysteria and destroying their children/partner's media for them. They can actually have a pretty corrosive force.

And of course there is the effigy element of it. Even if other locals do not give up their media, knowing that a group is going around collecting for destruction something you consider important can be a bit unnerving... esp if they start using actual bonfires.

Thus, stuff like this in isolation seems harmless, but can tie in to a larger pattern or even become bigger themselves.

Good people, I'm so happy you're all here tonight, but please, just a few words of caution. Now we are going to set this pile of evil ablaze, but because these are children's toys, the fire will spread quickly. So please stand back and try not to inhale the toxic fumes...

That's the best way to do it, really. Take advantage of their lack of logic by at least making a profit.

Now if only people would trade in their violent video games for guns and go shooting this southingonSOS folks, it might be on an equal level of logic to what they're doing. Nothing like the equivalent of "Voluntary" book burning, because clearly that's worked out so well in the past.

Except they are using an incorrect assumptions 'evidences' and this sort of thing add to the weight of their incorrect argument. It's not much of a leap from and emotional argument to have a volunteer system to 'See all these people agree, clearly we need a law.'

In this case it was the fact that his mother took him to the firing range and he had a better understanding of the weapons he had than some joe schmo who just picked it up from the store or stole it from someones house and went on a spree. If you look at the history of these events more often than not the primary weapon of choice will jam and a secondary less effective weapon will start to be used. The pistol was only used to kill himself here. No amount of COD is going to teach you how maintain to reduce j

My evidence is experience and empirical. A typical Bushmaster AR 15 , which while looks mean is a pretty cheap gun, freshly taken out of the box is not going to shoot thousands of rounds without issues. They need to be broken in, maintained, and gotten used to. I've seen plenty of people show up at the range with their brand new NRA hats and take out their shiny new black rifle, typically an AR 15 of some sort, try to pop off 15 rounds as fast as they can only to get 6 off. Or if it does work sit there scratching their heads wondering why they missed with every single shot. Malfunctions are quite common, for some definition of common which is arguable, for those who don't really know what they are doing and haven't taken care of things properly. All i'm saying is there is more to being proficient than possessing a gun, and video games don't help any.

So what of all those children in other Western countries who watch the same movies and TV shows and play the same video games and have nearly the same access to weapons as do Americans, yet they don't go on violent rampages with the frequency of Americans?

I have to question the neutrality of any article that includes something like this line: Some include cut scenes (i.e., brief movie clips supposedly designed to move the story forward) of strippers.

Really? Do they? And is the author trying to make a point about the violence of games in some sort of actual scientific manner, or is just trying to convince people games are 'bad' so threw in a line about strippers, which has nothing at all to do with violence?

OK, but counter to that, what stories actually do glorify violence? Rather than simply present it?

I thought one of the ironies of the NRA speech on the subject was that the two movies Wayne picked out, NBK and American Psycho, actually present violence negatively. At the same time, Wayne's "The only thing that can stop a bad guy with a gun is a good guy with a gun" was right out of a John Wayne or Clint Eastwood movie.